Repairing old brickwork and having extensions

[Feltwell]

the house does have cavity walls (which I guess is unusual for one this old).

Yes, certainly is. Cavity walls came in gradually, but it's unusual to find a Victorian house with them - usually the earliest you see them is around the 1920's. I have a friend with a 1940's house in Bristol which was built with solid 9" walls, which is late for that method of constrcution and is the same as how most Victorian brick properties were built.

 

[MdB]

Cavity walls came in gradually, but it's unusual to find a Victorian house with them - usually the earliest you see them is around the 1920's. I have a friend with a 1940's house in Bristol which was built with solid 9" walls, which is late for that method of constrcution and is the same as how most Victorian brick properties were built.

Our 1970's extension has 9" solid walls and I very much wish they didn't...

<goes off and mutters something about cowboy Cornish builders...>

 

[Feltwell]

Could be worse - one student house we rented had the tiny kitchen in a flat roofed extension built with 4 1/2" walls. It was relatively new as well (and damp, and freezing cold.....)

 

[MdB]

Could be worse - one student house we rented had the tiny kitchen in a flat roofed extension built with 4 1/2" walls. It was relatively new as well (and damp, and freezing cold.....)

Ah that would have been the front of our house.. (One of the reasons we rebuilt it, the others being it supported the first floor and roof, was built on the edge of a narrow stub rubble wall and because all the cracks in the render let the damp in)

<goes off mumbling a bit more about cowboy Cornish builders...>

 

[stuart45]

Cavity walls were quite common in some areas like Portsmouth and Southampton from 1860 onwards. Some of them were built in Mock Flemish, and had 9 inch inner walls, so they might appear to be solid.

 

[spot]

Hi Matthew,

Just been reading your blog... Did you ever dig down to find out if you'd found your well?
I've got one somewhere in my back garden that was capped about 1956, I spoke to the previous owner who was in the house when it was done and they've shown me the approx location of where they remember it to be so at some stage i'll be having a dig around for mine!

 

[MatthewC]

Hi Matthew,

Just been reading your blog... Did you ever dig down to find out if you'd found your well?!

"Did I ever..?" Have I had time? I'm re-building an extension, not to mention finishing off the inside of the main house. Perhaps then I'll get on to the garden...

The blog will tell you when I do. By Saturday you'll see what I've been up to this week, and next week looks pretty busy too.

 

[spot]

Excuses, excuses...
Actually I was reading your blog at work and I didn't realise I was only seeing bits of it due to portions of it getting blocked by the data nazis.
Err, yeah you have got a bit of work on haven't you? Good luck!